'I Made A Conscious Decision': Danielle MacDonald Won't Be Pigeonholed

Danielle Macdonald is at the top of her game. Image: GettySource:Whimn

The Australian actress on navigating and succeeding in Hollywood.

Danielle Macdonald is one of Australia’s most exceptional exports.

In most articles you read about her, in fact, they’ll inevitably refer to the Australian actress as a ‘rising star’.

However, having already graced the cover of Teen Vogue’s infamous Young Hollywood issue, being profiled by the likes of Vanity Fair and attending the Academy Awards with a handful of critically acclaimed films under her belt, Macdonald’s star has, arguably, already risen and everyone else needs to catch up. Fast.

The Northern beaches born actress is chameleonic in her craft. Unlike other young Australian actresses who might hit the big time and then be forced to play the same character for years before being able to enter their ‘indie phase’, Danielle’s portfolio doesn’t have two same roles. Whether it’s in the critically acclaimed Patti Cake$ as an aspiring rapper from New Jersey, to the young woman subverting the beauty pageant industry in rom-com Dumplin’ or trying to survive the apocalypse in Bird Box, she has demonstrated, already, a breadth of ability and talent most only establish when they’ve been in the industry twice as long as she has.

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Dumplin' is the story of Texan teen who challenges her town's outdated ideas of beauty and empowers young girls around her in the process.

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This, she reveals to whimn.com.au, is no coincidence. Talking to the actor, who’s currently back home for the Sydney Film Festival, she speaks with a calm matter-of-factness about what it took to get her to where she is today. “After Patti Cake$ came out I made a very conscious decision to not take on roles that could pigeonhole me,” she says, with a knowingness of how the industry can manipulate. “I mean, don't get me wrong, I've also been lucky to get the opportunities to allow that to happen, but yes, I have made deliberate decisions with my team."

Macdonald is quick to credit they're support and clever judgement. "Things that came up, when I wasn't working as much and struggling to get jobs, that my managers said no to. I was like ‘yeah, but it's a job’, and they told me, ‘No, you're not going out to be the butt of a joke. It's not happening’."

While some of those roles weren’t necessarily awful, she admits the timing would have made them potentially poisonous to her career. “Sure, it could be a really fun, great role and maybe someday I'll be able to do it but right now I'll get pigeonholed,” says Macdonald, revealing how attuned to the industry she is, and how well she’s already navigating it to ensure her longevity.

Having left home in the Northern Beaches at 18 to pursue her dream in Hollywood, on the face of it, she’s just like any other aspiring Australian actor. But what sets Macdonald a part, she believes, is that nobody thought she could do it. It’s meant that rather than erode her sense of confidence, Hollywood has only made it stronger.

“Growing up wanting to be in this industry, everyone was like, “Oh honey, you're going to be rejected,’ she says with a laugh, “Whereas I have a lot of very beautiful friends come out that are the idea of perfection in their hometown. Then they come to Hollywood and there's like there's a million of them. That's very hard on people.

“Everyone has a different mindset. I shouldn't have felt like I couldn't make it as a teenager, but I think that's why I found confidence from doing it whereas other people lose confidence. It's because society has twisted perceptions of what is right and what is wrong, and who is great and who isn't.”

Danielle at the Sydney Film Festival. Image: AAPSource:Whimn

Macdonald's latest role has also been one of her most difficult. As Julie in Skin, she plays a single-mother of three who grew up in a family of Ku Klux Klan members. As an adult, she left, but her previous associations make it hard for her to properly establish a life outside of that world. As a result the only work she can get is for her daughters as performers at neo-Nazi rallies. It’s at one of those rallies that she meets skinhead Bryon (played by Jamie Bell).

The film is based on the true story of his life, in which he was inspired by his love for Julie to leave the life of racist violence, ideology and vitriol and be reformed member of society. The film was selected for the Toronto and Tribeca Film Festivals, recently showed at the Sydney Film Festival, and also exists as an Academy Award-winning short-film, which Danielle also starred in.

Macdonald in 'Skin'. Image: A24Source:Whimn

For Macdonald, one of the most challenging parts was trying to understand how her character could enter a relationship with someone in such an unfathomable world.

“You're born into it, you don't know any other way, she'd been homeless, she had had all these things and the only way they were making money was the connections that they knew. You're trying to get out but you're straddling this line because the only people that will give you jobs,” she reasons.

It’s a tough film to watch and one that ultimately asks this single question: can anyone, even extremist white supremacists who realise the error of their ways, be forgiven? “I had to ask myself that going into it,” Macdonald admits to wrestling over the concept herself.

In fact, she recalls her first meeting with Bell involved a dinner where they nearly talked themselves out of doing the film because they ended up having more questions than answers. Ultimately, she saw the value in the question being asked in the first place. “Everyone's going to have a different answer obviously, and that's fair,” she says, adding, "If we don't allow people to change, nothing will change. We will just let this vicious cycle continue. We'll teach our children the same hatred, and nothing will ever be different.”

Macdonald speaks with the kind of genuine wisdom and empathy you rarely encounter in actors her age, let alone at her level of success. She’s someone you can’t help but root for, which is fantastic news if you’re a betting kind of person, because you’re backing someone who’s already on her way to more success.

For now though, she’s just looking forward to being able to enjoy the Aussie sunset from the comfort of her own balcony in Avalon: “It’s home”.